Former TikTok chief and ex-Disney veteran Kevin Mayer has joined the Board of Administrators at South Korea-born leisure large HYBE.
Los Angeles-based Mayer was put in as a non-executive director of HYBE at a shareholders’ assembly on March 31, based on Korean information outlet, Cash At present Broadcasting (MTN).
He’s at the moment Co-CEO/Founding father of Blackstone-backed American “subsequent technology” media firm Candle Media, and Co-Founder and Managing Accomplice of VC agency Smash Capital.
In 2022, Candle Media acquired Spanish-language content material agency Exile Content material Studio, co-founded by present HYBE America Chairman/CEO, Isaac Lee. MTN experiences that the acquisition “established a connection” between HYBE and Mayer.
Mayer’s appointment comes amid a interval of serious change at HYBE America, which just lately rebranded its Nashville division as Blue Freeway Information following the departure of Huge Machine Label Group founder Scott Borchetta.
It additionally arrives at a pivotal second for HYBE’s mum or dad firm, which posted report annual revenues of $1.86 billion for 2025 and is gearing up for the BTS World Tour ARIRANG — an 82-show stadium tour throughout 23 nations. BTS’s comeback album, additionally titled Arirang, broke Ok-Pop streaming information on Spotify, Apple Music, and Amazon Music upon its launch on March 20.
Mayer, who was additionally the COO of mum or dad firm ByteDance, joined TikTok in Might 2020, turning into the platform’s first-ever US-based CEO. However he resigned lower than 4 months into the position amid turmoil attributable to the Donald Trump administration’s calls for that TikTok unload a piece of its US enterprise.
Entry Industries, the bulk proprietor of Warner Music Group, subsequently introduced in November 2020 that Mayer had joined its ranks as a “senior media adviser”, a job by which he served till 2023. He additionally had a two-year fastened time period as Chairman of the board at sports activities platform DAZN from 2021 to 2023.
Previous to TikTok, Mayer was Chairman of Direct-to-Shopper & Worldwide at Disney – a place by which he led the rollout of video streaming service Disney+, which surpassed 50m paying subscribers in April, 5 months after launch.
Moreover, he led Disney’s different direct-to-consumer companies, together with Hulu, ESPN+, and Hotstar, and oversaw Disney’s worldwide operations, international advert gross sales, and international content material gross sales.
Beforehand, as Disney’s Chief Technique Officer, Mayer helped orchestrate the corporate’s acquisitions of Pixar, Marvel, Lucasfilm, and most of twenty first Century Fox.
Mayer spent 22 years working at Disney in whole, throughout two stints (1993-2000, after which 2005-2020).
Within the interim, he served in roles together with the CEO of Playboy.com, and Chairman/CEO of Clear Channel Interactive.
He at the moment serves on the board of Harvard Enterprise Faculty, in addition to on the boards of Tinuiti and The Forest Highway Firm. He’s additionally an advisory board member at Salesforce and a member of the board of trustees at The Paley Middle for Media.Music Enterprise Worldwide
